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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwXEgg1tfE0 This video highlights the social ent

ID: 3503533 • Letter: H

Question

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwXEgg1tfE0

This video highlights the social entrepreneurship of Joe Whinney, founder of Seattle’s Theo Chocolate. Instead of working with local farmers in the United States, Whinney sources his company’s raw ingredients from poor cocoa growers in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The visionary leader pays these farmers higher rates as a way to help improve Congo farming communities.

How does social entrepreneur Joe Whinney demonstrate his commitment to using business to serve society and the public good?

How did Whinney’s partnership with a charity organization enable Theo Chocolate to be profitable and address justice issues at the same time?

How do farming communities in Congo benefit from their business relationship with Theo Chocolate?

How does Theo’s business benefit from having a partnership with impoverished farmers in Congo?

Explanation / Answer

Answer 1.

Joe Whinney started Theo Chocolate as the first organic, Fair Trade certified, bean-to-bar chocolate company in the United States and in the process provided a radical business solution to the social and environmental problems present in the cocoa industry. By ensuring the process of making the finest artisan chocolate remains ethical and sustainable way, in North America, Theo created economic value by producing the finest artisan chocolate, but it also created societal value by addressing social and environmental needs of the cocoa plantation farmers, extricating them out of the age old colonial bondage of slavery and making them empowered and equal stakeholders in fixing the price for their raw materials. Moreover, by focusing on the use non-GMO raw materials such as cocoa, soy and corn used in the production of the bars, Whitney was able to deflect the domination of the corporatisation of food through scientifically processed genetically modified food and thus create a greater awareness about the health benefits of consuming and promoting organic food.